


Hemostasis

by HostisHumaniGeneris



Category: Scream (Movies)
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Gen, Serial Killers, Survivor Guilt, Trick or Treat: Trick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-30
Updated: 2018-10-30
Packaged: 2019-07-27 22:47:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16228877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HostisHumaniGeneris/pseuds/HostisHumaniGeneris
Summary: The Woodsboro Murders have ended, and Sidney Prescott narrowly survived the plans of Billy Loomis and Stu Macher had wrought.  Still, she's left to ponder why two people she trusted ended up as monstrous as they did, and how she could have failed to see it in time.





	Hemostasis

**Author's Note:**

  * For [summerdayghost](https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerdayghost/gifts).



The smell of flowers and antiseptic was almost sickening.  Dewey had looked like a wax figure of himself, pale and very still.  She kept her eyes on him for too long, so she wasn’t even able to make sure he was breathing.  For a long while, the only evidence he was alive was the EKG and the long, rasping coughs he’d occasionally break into. 

His parents had allowed her to come in, long after she and Sheriff Burke had talked things over.  The Rileys seemed somewhat checked out though; after what had happened to their son and daughter, they were shell-shocked and Sid wasn’t sure they recognized her.  Given what had driven the murders—at least, what had driven Billy, Sidney felt that might be for the best.

Things like this weren’t supposed to happen in small towns like Woodsboro. 

To people like Sidney Prescott.

When he woke up, Dewey was happy to see Sid.  According to Dewey, the knife hit a nerve.  It would take a lot of time and a lot of PT, but he would walk again.  How well was up in the air.  He was trying to stay positive, which Sidney supposed was good.

Dewey asked about the investigation, and was disappointed to hear that it was cordial _until_ the State Police came.  The Woodsboro police department was nowhere near prepared to deal with something of this magnitude, so the Troopers came to ‘help’.  Every question seemed to be appended with the detective muttering “ _Really?_ ”.  Her story was unbelievable, yes, but it was the truth.  She left the Sheriff’s Office feeling empty; Sheriff Burke apologizing for everything.  

The conversation continued to frivolous things, but then the conversation drifted to Tatum somehow. 

Dewey would be in a wheelchair for her funeral.

The police were still trying to figure out the entire sequence of events; was it Billy or Stu who was the one to kill her?  It didn’t really matter; they had been working together, planning their murder spree together.  It didn’t really matter.

But she couldn’t help but keep thinking about it.  Stu was at the party, but he left the room, and Billy showed up late.  Stu had sent her out to get beer, right?  Was that setting her up for Billy to kill her or was it…  She hated thinking about the whole sequence of events, but she couldn’t stop doing that.  In some moments she wondered how monstrous Stu could have been to do that to her, then she remembered that Billy was… Billy.  His patience with her unwillingness, how strong he seemed in the face of his mother leaving.

She and Dewey had shifted the conversation to something frivolous after he tried to reassure her that no, what happened to Tatum was not Sid’s fault, that she had noting to do with it.  That was all meaningless background noise as she kept picking away at the pieces.  Sidney was the ‘final girl’, the big finale that Billy and Stu planned—if not for her, would they have killed Tatum?  She knew that Stu had killed Gale's cameraman because Sidney had fled to his van. That first time, when he called her while she was home alone, and chased her around the house… what was the plan?  It felt like Billy or Stu was trying to kill her at the time, she barely got out of it by the skin of her teeth.  And Billy always intended for her to be the final act of his movie; killing her because he blamed her mom for his mom leaving.  If he had killed her then… the story would’ve been over, right?

Dewey had told her to stop.  Billy and Stu were insane bastards, thinking that they’d just stop was wrong.  The only thing surviving that night meant was that she was still alive.  That was something to be thankful for.  It didn’t stop her from wondering about what if.

It was almost a relief when a nurse came in and shooed Sidney out of the room.

Not quite a relief because it ended up she no longer had that background noise.  Her father was in the waiting room, setting down the paper and taking her by the arm, but they said nothing as they just drove.  Not home, they just drove. 

She just looked at the town going past and tried to figure out _why._ Some things made the twisted sort of sense, others did not. She couldn't remember any particular grudge Stu or Billy had with Principal HImbry; was it just to add another person to the body count? Gale Weather's cameraman just had the unfortunate luck of being too close to Sidney.  Casey had broken up with Stu, so that is why the first two victims were Casey and her boyfriend.  Except that wasn’t true.  The first victim was one year ago, it was her mother.  She glanced at her father, tears starting to well up. 

For that year, she thought she’d break.  She and Dad took the loss really hard.  There wasn’t much to take solace in; Aunt Kate was doing her best to be there for them, Cotton Weary was going to die for her murder and that Billy was there for her.  He was her _rock_.

It seemed childish to her now, thinking back to how much she had trusted Billy, wanted to be there for Billy, set up boundaries she eventually let Billy push his way through.  When that Billy she loved was just an act for something roiling and monstrous underneath.  Something that killed her mother, then waited a year, listening to her cry and pretending to be sympathetic while planning to kill so many people, including her and her father, blaming him for all those deaths.

Stu was even more of problem.  He just went along with Billy’s plan?  He was always a jackass, always so cheerful about inappropriate bullshit, but how the Hell could he have don that?

The more she thought about it, the more it made it hurt.  So much pain and suffering, so much insanity.  How could two ‘normal’ guys, maybe a little weird, but normal guys… one of whom she’d give anything to, had depended on in the darkest times she’d been through, how could people like that do all of this?  How could they be responsible?

How could she have fallen for it? 

Because there had to be signs.  They couldn’t have seemed that normal to her, she had to be blind to trust them, to love Billy.

She hadn’t realized dad had pulled the car to the side of the road until she stopped crying.  She looked over to the driver’s seat, and her father’s eyes were red too.  He leaned over and wrapped an arm around her. 

“Need to talk?” He asked, not breaking the hug.  He’d trusted them to, he was within seconds of dying with the belief that he’d be framed for his daughter’s murder, all because her boyfriend blamed his wife, had been the one to brutalize her.

“I don’t… I just feel like this is my…”

“Don’t.” He said.  “It wasn’t your fault, anymore than it was your mother’s.  It was Loomis and Macher’s.”

“I just… so many people died…”

He nodded, before looking at her.  “And?  You survived.  You and Randy and me.  The only things you’re responsible were keeping us that way.”

She gulped, and looked up at him.  He turned off the ignition and looked at her. 

There was a lot to say.

But she had to start.

**Author's Note:**

> I went with something immediately post _Scream_ because my brainstorming for setting it after the sequels just kept getting a little too silly trying to factor in each and every additional victim and killer and their motives. Hopefully that was alright.


End file.
